


After Dark

by storieswelove



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Book 3: The King of Attolia (Queen's Thief), F/M, basically her perpetual state post-marriage, early relationship feels, just perpetually soft for the two of them lbr, soft, trust and brooding from irene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:15:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24730678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storieswelove/pseuds/storieswelove
Summary: Eugenides tries to take Irene across the atrium ceiling for the first time. Missing scene fromKing of Attolia.
Relationships: Attolia | Irene/Eugenides
Comments: 12
Kudos: 56





	After Dark

**Author's Note:**

> My first QT fic, for QT Appreciation Week on Tumblr. A missing scene I think of often: how Gen persuaded Irene to walk across the ceiling with him.

From where he stands at the edge of the ceiling joist, Eugenides offers her his hand. 

“Absolutely not,” she says, indignant. She crosses her arms for good measure. She cannot stop him from recklessly scaling the castle rafters in the dead of night, but that does _not_ mean she has to participate. 

He flashes her a grin in return, a wicked thing she’s always thought made him look young. She’s beginning to wonder if perhaps it merely makes him look wicked. 

“Irene,” he says, pointedly. He pauses for dramatic effect — everything her husband does is for dramatic effect — but, rather than continue, he swings one foot over the edge of the beam and squats down on his other, right leg extended out into mid-air before him. He raises a single eyebrow and waits a beat for her to react. 

When she doesn’t, he winks, pulls his extended foot to the edge of the wooden beam, and pushes off into a spin like one of the lithe dancers from the courts of Ferria, outstretched leg leveraging his weight to keep him turning above the perilous drop. 

She sees it the instant it happens. The former Thief of Eddis, once famed for his climbing and agility, begins to wobble mid-turn, no chance of recovery on the narrow beam on which he’s balanced. Like the Oracles in temples of gods she doesn’t worship, Irene sees the future clear before her — twice a widow. What remains of her heart irreparably broken. War. Inevitable death for her, too. She wouldn’t fight it. 

Instead, for the second time in as many months, she watches her now-husband come back from what she’d believed to be certain death. As if held up by the gods themselves, Eugenides rights his treacherous tilt and stands up straight with the haughty grace of a cat.

He turns to her, but his smug grin slips into something softer when he sees her face. “Irene,” he says again, quieter but as assured as ever. “My god will not let me fall. Not until it is my time. As long as you are with me, he will keep you safe, too.” He extends his hand again. 

Irene believed, for many years, that her life was split into a before and after. Before her father and brother died. Before she was the shadow princess. Before she killed her husband. She’d assumed the rest of her life would be one unending struggle — to maintain power. To make decisions. To stay alive. 

And she was correct. Her life _was_ split into a before and after. But now, she thought it might be before and after Eugenides. And instead of struggle, perhaps her “after” was _trust_. Trust in her husband. Trust in a future they could win.

Trust even in gods, evidently. 

With a sigh and narrowed eyes, she reaches one hand up to grab her husband’s and pulls her skirts up off her ankles with the other. And with a bright grin she’s beginning to believe he reserves for only her, Eugenides helps her clamber onto the sill. 

She follows her husband as he leads her safely across the atrium rafters, eyes on her as he walks backward with a faith in his god she can only hope to one day have in him.

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone wondering: [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Boc3oYYf6qw) is what I'm picturing he does when he pushes off at a spin. 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Massive thanks to [iridescentfeline](iridescentfeline.tumblr.com) for the last minute beta.
> 
> Come scream about QT with me on tumblr @ [storieswelove](storieswelove.tumblr.com)! Fic crossposted [here](https://storieswelove.tumblr.com/post/620965287883309056/after-dark-the-queens-thief) for easy access.


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